RomanPunks is a retrofuturistic, cyberpunk derivative world-building project inspired by fine art, history and the cryptopunk movement.
A total of 1,000 RomanPunk characters have been frozen in time and minted as Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs) on the Ethereum, WAX, Polygon and Algorand blockchains.
RomanPunk characters are comprised of commoners and famous individuals based on Roman history, art history and pop culture.
The basis for RomanPunk lore and backstories is exhaustively researched by history/sci-fi buff and co-founder, Punktavian.
All images are drawn by hand by woman artist and co-founder, Cleopunktra, without the aid of AI or generative tools.
RomanPunks came into existence through early minting on OpenSea, promoting on Twitter and building a Discord community through giveaways and engagement. The idea of a cyberpunk-derivative ‘RomanPunk’ theme was in our heads for years, but it was the success of the Cryptopunks that became the catalyst for project conception and launch.
After a hard working first 60 days spent networking and attracting new collectors to RomanPunks, our community had begun to flourish and sales increased. We began to offer our collectors an opportunity to battle their NFTs in a tournament bracket powered by dice rolls.
Encouraged by the tight knit community and the carbon-neutral blockchain with lightning fast and low cost transactions, we launched 'romanpunksio' collection on WAX Blockchain as the first step to expand the backstories of our RomanPunk characters and the baseline for future development of a card game.
RomanPunks integrated with Chainlink Labs to utilize VRF (Verified Randomness Function) to host a giveaway raffle for our holders. We developed a smart contract on Ethereum which guarantees true random number selection on chain and can be used for a wide range of functions that require random selection.
After much anticipation in the community, we released our first WAX NFT card 'pack' through the Neftyblocks platform, which sold out in less than a week.
We launched our Twitch channel and begun building an audience by offering numerous giveaways of WAX NFTs from our collection, as well as giving participants a chance to win RomanPunk ETH NFT airdrops for taking top spot at the end of the 'season'.
As firm believers in a metaverse future and land owners in The Sandbox, we undertook to build the RomanPunk Colosseum on 1x1 land and entered our experience "Gladiator Bloodsport" into a GameJam contest. We will continue to build the Colosseum into a PVP arena and social hub once The Sandbox offers creators the ability to do so.
Thanks to the user friendly tools offered by NeftyBlocks, we launched a comprehensive blending system on WAX, allowing our collectors to blend the common NFTs they earn in our Discord RPG up into Legendary famous NFTs through the use of blending 'coins' that can also be earned on the Discord as reward for helping to promote the RomanPunks project.
We launched the VX collection on Polygon. Each owner of an ETH NFT gets their voxel equivalent airdropped to them, and these NFTs can be redeemed for official NFTs on The Sandbox Marketplace once available.
All 1,000 original, unique 1:1 RomanPunk characters hand drawn by Cleopunktra and minted on OpenSea.
The RomanPunk WAX NFT Trading Card Fighter Pack Series II consists of 3 NFTs randomly selected from over 236 characters.
Upcoming plans for RomanPunks include:
Below is a comprehensive and searchable directory of all 1,000 RomanPunk Characters.
Born 197 BC in Nikonion, Joe was born a slave, toiling in the vast wheat fields of the steppe until one day he saved his master’s life by killing a Pontic magistrate who had come to arrest and execute him for tax evasion. Freed, now Joe lives life on the run.
Born in 51 BC in Gaetulia, Wisi Yende, a footsoldier in the army of the Musulamii tribe, was abducted by aliens during a Sahara desert sandstorm and pressed into service to fight a cyberwar in a distant future dimension.
Born 2161 AD in Tingis, Sabria was sold into servitude to a Roman senator obsessed with ancient Numidian texts. He gave her a gold monocle to read for him—she used it to learn for herself. In Neo-Carthage, she moves through elite circles unnoticed, feeding intelligence to the resistance. At a cursed relic auction, she drew in Velia Vulfric—the flippant socialite with a taste for the macabre—whose curiosity she gradually turned into complicity, and perhaps something more…
Born 67 BC in Pella, Aris is Cicero’s true executioner—though the history books credit the deed to Marc Antony’s lackeys. His mind is controlled by a cabal of cyborg Illuminati engaged in time manipulation. Once it was decided Cicero knew too much and had to be extinguished, the cyborgs bent Aris to their will, using his executioner’s axe as the perfect instrument to silence a threat that could have upended their interdimensional dominion.
Born in 360 AD in Isca Augusta to a Roman soldier and Iceni mother, Morgaine rebelled against her abusive father, waging a guerilla war against Roman occupation until she was caught by her own half brother and sentenced to die by gladiator combat.
Born 121 BC in Jutland, Cindi was a defiant warrior captured and enslaved by Gaius Marius at the Battle of Vercellae. Refusing to submit to concubinage, she was dispatched to an atomic age alternate dimension where she toils as a scullery maid and comfortess in a high-altitude air cruise liner zeppelin.
Born 123 BC on the mystical isle of Læsø, Sigrid comes from an advanced tribe of wealthy salt barons with access to interdimensional travel. When not gallivanting through the future, she spends her time training champion ‘golden retriever’ canines on her remote, bucolic island paradise.
Born in 431 AD in Hippo Regius to a Vandal marauder and a Roman nun, Brunhilda was an acrobatic performer pressed into service as a gladiator after all the fighting men were dispatched to sack Rome for the 3rd time.
Born 61 AD in Fife, Mac was captured by Agricola’s troops at the Battle of Mons Graupius and dispatched to Mauritania by Emperor Domitian as a slave farmer. While toiling in the fields, he discovered an interdimensional portal which he used to escape to an alternate 20th century in which the Roman Empire remains unvanquished. Now he operates a chariot harvester on a commercial wheat farm.
Born 70 AD in Aventicum, Jo is a passionate baker and trailblazing founder of the interdimensional cupcake franchise known as “The Swiss Miss”, whose beloved products are mass produced and enjoyed infinitely across space and time.
Robovid XLV is an advanced cybernetic model created by Vitruvian Systems of the Eternal Dominion that infiltrates human society by masquerading as key individuals across multiple dimensions in order to manipulate the system from within. This particular model is trained in advanced rhetoric and tuned for relentless ambition to be deployed at the highest echelons of society.
Born in 185 AD in Fife, Osgar was raised to hate the Romans and fought stubbornly against the invasion of Septimius Severus in 208 AD, using future technology obtained from dimension hopping druids to help push the invaders back to Hadrian’s Wall.
Born 315 AD in Aksum, Zosimus was cast into an interdimensional portal as a child sacrifice to the gods. Now he resides on the Roman Exocolony Proxima Centauri where his athletic prowess have allowed him to catapult to the top of the Celestial Badminton League (CBL) standings where he remains undefeated after seven hundred sanctioned singles matches.
Born 2175 AD in Alexandria, Aker is a clerical assistant at the Library of Alexandria Innovation Hub where researchers have developed the “Giza Glasses”, a groundbreaking AR technology that enables wearers to temporarily inhabit bodies across dimensions. Night after night, Aker sneaks into the library’s vault to use the glasses, immersing himself in the lives of ancient pharaohs to experience firsthand the splendor and challenges of divine rule.
Born 139 AD in Tarsus, Balacrus is as staunch defender of Roman interests in his native Cilicia. Upon learning of a planetary alien and cyborg invasion, Balacrus enlisted in Marcus Aurelius’ interdimensional task force to protect his native Earth from the extraterrestrial scourge.
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romanpunks@protonmail.ch
Registered in Ontario, Canada
